


Going Off Script

by paraboobizarre



Category: The Following
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Dark, Domestic, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-04-06
Updated: 2013-04-06
Packaged: 2017-12-07 17:07:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,309
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/750946
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/paraboobizarre/pseuds/paraboobizarre
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>What if, a year and half, into their assignment, Jacob and Paul simply ran away from the Following?</p><p>Every creak and groan in their new house puts him on high alert, half expecting someone to charge through the door and put a bullet between his eyes. But it never happens...</p>
            </blockquote>





	Going Off Script

It's not as easy as the first time. They had help back then, people pulling strings in the background. This time it's just them and they spend months planning every detail of it. Still, it feels almost too easy and Paul spends the first few months jolting awake at night, terrified he made a mistake somewhere along the way. Every creak and groan in their new house puts him on high alert, half expecting someone to charge through the door and put a bullet between his eyes. But it never happens.

He gets a job as a systems administrator at the community college and Jacob gets certified for special ed, both of them too scared to do anything too similar to their old jobs.  
They fight a lot too in the first few months. Back then they never really argued, always too preoccupied with projecting the image of the picture perfect gay couple. Now they're not pretending anymore and reality rears its ugly head. When Paul is not looking over his shoulder for Roderick, he's terrified Jacob will just up and leave one day, realizing that all this is simply not worth it. But that never happens.  
They fight and they make up again and with time it gets better, both of them learning to pick their battles.

Instead of Sarah now there's Todd from across the street. Todd with his pastel button downs and suede loafers, his teeth so perfect and white against the tanning salon orange-brown of his skin. Todd shows up on the fifth day, brandishing a bottle of scotch and making a song and dance about welcoming them to the neighborhood.

  
If it were up to Paul he'd tell Todd to get lost. He doesn't like the look of him. There's just something about that manicured lawn, that eternally pristine Prius in the driveway and the standard 2.3 scrubbed kids of Todd's that's off putting. Jacob wants to be nice, however, so they invite him in.  
Todd chatters on and on about how great the neighborhood is _oh you'll love it here_ but Paul sees the way Todd's eyes are greedily slithering over every little piece inside their house, trying to get a hold of them.  
Jacob runs ahead to go look for glasses and Paul follows behind Todd. They hardly unpacked anything yet other than the bare necessities but Jacob, in a strange fit of nesting instinct, has already hung up a few pictures.

There's the picture of Jacob and his mum, taken at a wedding and Todd smiles, obviously pleased. The only other picture in the hallway is the one of them in front of the Lighthouse Bed and Breakfast and Paul watches Todd's sure stride falter just slightly. Something in his posture becomes a little more upright and when Paul shows him into the kitchen, Todd's seemingly indestructible smile seems a bit strained.  
They toast and Paul can't resist putting his arm around Jacob's waist and kissing his cheek. _Oh yes, we're so happy to be here, aren't we babe?_  
After a few awkward sips Todd suddenly remembers an important appointment and that marked the first and last time he ever set foot into their house.  
Now the only kind of interaction they have is when Jacob and he vigorously ignore Todd's outraged huffing and puffing whenever they kiss in public. Paul half expects Todd to confront them about it but that never happens. Unfortunately...

After four months of living here Paul opens the door one morning to find a cat sitting on their front porch. It wobbles in, falling over his shoes and crushing into the wardrobe. It's a malnourished, disheveled looking thing and if it were up to Paul, he'd get rid of it immediately. As soon as Jacob sees it though, this option is off the table. They take it to the vet, who tells them that the cat is (a) female, (b) blind and (c) full of fleas. She gets a few shots, flea baths and a collar and they take her home to fatten her up. They put up pictures, but no one ever comes to claim her. Despite all his fussing, Jacob still calls her "cat", but Paul had a name for her within the first week.

The first time Jacob hears him call the cat Emma, he raises an eyebrow but he doesn't say anything. Personally, Paul thinks it's oddly fitting.  
After a month Emma stops bumping into furniture, navigating around the house with somnambulist confidence instead.  
“We can never move the furniture ever again,” Jacob observes one night as they lie on the couch, watching as Emma rounds the coffee table, narrowly missing running headlong into one of its legs. Paul just sighs, wondering when the day will come when he will just want to drown the cat. But that day never comes.

It's a year and a half later and everything they ran away from already feels like a feverish dream to Paul, when he comes home one evening to find Jacob watching TV in the living room.

“...as the investigation continues. Authorities are also looking for Joey Matthews and his nanny, Denise Harris...”

“Did they get Sarah?” He hears himself say, surprised that this is the first question to make it out of his mouth.  
He hasn't thought of Sarah since the night they left.  
“Yep.” Jacob nods, rubbing at his face, looking suddenly very tired.  
Paul doesn't know how he feels about Sarah. He doesn't know if he feels good or bad. If anything, he feels indifferent. She was nice enough, but she was never more to him than a walking corpse. The fact that she didn't know that, doesn't change it. So instead of saying anything he kicks off his shoes, shrugs out of his jacket and slumps down on the couch next to Jacob to watch the reports.

Emma got Joey out and Joe got captured by Hardy again, everything went according to plan. A picture of a man and woman appears in the corner of the screen and a reporter looks sternly at the camera. In the background there's their old house.

“...Fuller's neighbors, Gideon and Christine Hillard, the latter shot by a police officer as they were taking...”

Jacob shuts off the TV and the ensuing silence is deafening. It feels like a long time before either of them speaks again.  
“That could have been us,” Jacob eventually says, in the flat tone of voice of someone finally acknowledging something they have known for a long time.  
Paul stares at the black TV screen and waits for the relief to set in, but it never comes.

That night, before going to bed, Paul checks the locks and activates the alarm like he always does. Looking out of the window across the street he sees the bluish flicker of the TV in Todd's house. Watching the news, maybe. Who knows. It's a big story.

Emma pads up to him silently, rubbing up against his legs and he picks her up. Scratching behind her ears, the entire cat vibrating she is purring so hard, Paul imagines Todd sitting on his couch in front of the TV watching the news coverage.  
The nanny, the abducted kid, the crazy neighbors and dead dead Sarah, such a lovely corpse. Not a hair on his eternally perfect fiberglass helmet of a haircut out of place, there's Todd, making scandalized noises and tutting under his breath, safe in the knowledge that such a thing could never happen here.

Emma bumps her head against his chin and he holds her a little tighter, turning to climb up the stairs again.  
“What do you say we go visit Todd one of these days, huh, sweetie? Say _thank you_ for that scotch.” He coos under his breath, smiling to himself as he imagines _all_ the possibilities...


End file.
